


25,913 Days

by Cornerverse



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Episode: s03 Desperada, F/M, Reveal, What if Scenario, desperada spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-10
Updated: 2019-09-10
Packaged: 2020-10-14 02:08:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20592911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cornerverse/pseuds/Cornerverse
Summary: “Marinette,” Adrien sighed. “I used Second Chance 25,913 times trying to save you. How many of those do you think ended with Desperada stealing your earrings?”-Basically, yeah, what if on one of the tries Adrien found out who Ladybug was?





	25,913 Days

**Author's Note:**

> I tossed this together in like two days but it wouldn't leave me alone!

Adrien waited two days. He thought he’d be able to wait longer, after having the patience to try 25, 913 times to save Ladybug. But this? This was driving him crazy.

The moment he walked into the classroom, his eyes locked on her, glad to see she was on time for once. She was in the back, talking to Rose and Juleka, with Alya and Nino casually hanging out with her as well, all waiting for class to start.

Chloé started to say hi to him, but she stopped, almost startled. He couldn’t blame her. He looked, well, not exactly ‘a wreck’. As the model son of a fashion designer, Adrien wouldn’t be let out of the house if he didn’t look decent. But he looked tired, and he’d been nervously ruffling his hair so much that he’s surprised no one realized his secret identity.

So when Chloé saw him so obviously distressed, she began to ask what’s wrong. He silenced her with a half grin, and looked to the back. She followed his gaze, finding _he__r_. Taking a moment to process that, she sighed, nodded, and gave him a look that made sure he knew they’d be texting later.

He continued his walk. When Lila tried to say her usual good mornings, which somehow involved far too much grabbing him and being in his space, he just dodged. Very obviously dodged, as he went sideways and hopped over a desk. It didn’t matter that the action was suspicious and a few other classmates were staring. Not right now.

Running his hand through his hair one more time, Adrien approached.

“Hello, Marinette,” Adrien greeted.

“Good evening!” Marinette replied. “I mean- morning. Good. Good morning. I-It’s morning.”

“Wow,” Alya said, playfully elbowing her. “Not used to actually being in class in the morning, huh?”

While she seemed embarrassed by that fact, she did take the comment well. Really the girl looked more focused on Adrien than Alya’s comments. And if Adrien was being honest with himself, he was only focused on her.

“Actually,” Adrien began. “Could I talk to you about something? Alone?”

That sentence seemed to shift the mood of the entire class. All of them were waiting, expecting, hoping, dreading. Yet Adrien didn’t care about the tension right now.

“S-sure,” Marinette said.

“Great,” Adrien replied taking her hand. “Follow me, okay?”

She nodded, turning bright red from the physical contact, and he dragged her out of the classroom. He started to go down the hallway, but quickly ducked behind a corner. He waited, watching the door. After a moment he saw Alya walk out, look around and try to find them.

Thankfully, she headed the other way to try and look for them. After she was gone, Adrien gave Marinette another smile, and then dragged her away again. This time up the stairs. And up again. Then finally down another hall and through the door to the roof.

“Wh-what are we doing up here?” Marinette asked.

“Sorry,” Adrien said. “I just wanted to make sure we were actually alone.”

“Right,” she said. “What did you want to talk about? Not that I don’t want to hang out with a cool view of the city or anything! But class is soon and all.”

“I know,” he said. “But I wanted to talk about the other day. With the Akuma. Desperada.”

“Oh,” she said, glancing away for a moment. “I honestly don’t remember much of it! I was hiding until Ladybug, Chat Noir and that new Snake hero saved the day!”

He had to laugh at that. Marinette wasn’t a good liar. She hated liars, after all. One had to wonder how she could stand it, having to lie so much.

“Marinette,” Adrien sighed. “I used Second Chance 25,913 times trying to save you. How many of those do you think ended with Desperada stealing your earrings?”

She went through so many expressions at once. Confusion. Realization. Shock. Panic. Then planning. Pacing back and forth, trying to figure out exactly what to say and how to move forward. While he regretted putting her in this situation, he had to admit she looked wonderful like this. Intelligent, determined, ready to fight. Her gaze unwavering as she stared him down, previous nervousness suppressed by the mindset of a Hero.

“You can’t tell anyone,” Marinette finally said.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Adrien said. “I just didn’t think it was fair that you didn’t know that I know.”

“Thanks,” she said. “At least now I can plan around that. Though I guess secret identities are getting harder now. I mean, Rena and Carapace know who each other are, you know about Viperion. Literally everyone knows about Queen Bee. And it’s all-”

“I get it,” he said. “But there’s one more thing I need to tell you about.”

“Please tell me it’s not worse than you knowing about Ladybug?” she sighed.

“Maybe?” he answered, much to her dismay. “Look, I wasn’t going to tell you this part originally. But… After giving the Snake to Luka, you seemed like you were going to try and give me another Miraculous. I can’t do that. Because if you try to give me another one, we’ll be in the same scenario. And next time we won’t have Second Chance.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” she said, reassuringly putting a hand on his shoulder. “Just because the Snake didn’t work out doesn’t mean you’re not a good choice! I’m sure we can find a Miraculous that suits you much better! Maybe the Tiger? I guess the Dog might-”

“No!” he cut her off, if only to cover the fact that Plagg had hissed at that suggestion. “I mean, that’s not why you shouldn’t give me a Miraculous.”

“Why not then?” she wondered. “Trust me, you’re great. You would be a fantastic addition to the team! We just need to figure out which Miraculous is perfect for you.”

“That’s the thing,” he said. “I already found one that’s perfect for me.”

“Huh?” she replied, tilting her head.

“Think about it for a minute, Bugaboo,” he grinned.

Oh boy. That started round two of confusion, realization, shock and panic. This time she seemed to stay in panic. Just staring between his face, the way his hair was messed up, and of course the ring on his hand that he was currently fiddling with.

“Oh my god,” Marinette said, rubbing her temples. “Chat I swear I’m going to throw you off this roof!”

“That’s fair,” Adrien replied. “I know you didn’t want me to tell you but after what happened with the Snake, I mean. I tried as Aspik because I figured you wouldn’t be bringing him out often. I could just say that ‘Chat’ was on the other side of the city and couldn’t show up. But then we needed ‘Chat’ to win the battle. And-”

“And you can’t be another hero because you’re already Chat,” she groaned. “Of course. Of course I had to try and give freaking Chat Noir a different Miraculous.”

“If it makes you feel better,” he said. “If I were the one handing out Miraculous, I probably would’ve given you one. Guess I was right calling you our ‘Everyday Ladybug’!”

“You’re a disaster,” she replied.

“Love you too, bugaboo,” he said.

And she was back to panic and staring at him. This time her face was so red he was almost sure she’d catch fire soon. There was also a noise like a very high-pitched scream coming from the back of her throat.

“You’re Chat Noir,” Marinette stated.

“I think we already went over this,” Adrien said, unsure where she was going with this.

“You’re Chat Noir,” she repeated. “Chat Noir is in love with Ladybug. Adrien is Chat Noir. Which means Adrien is in love with Ladybug. And I’m Ladybug. Which means...”

“Which means I’m in love with you,” he finished. “And that still stands, now that I know. More than ever, really. I tried to convince myself that you were just a friend since I fell for Ladybug first, but, well, that didn’t work out too well.”

That didn’t help. Somehow her face was even redder than before, and that high pitched noise was back. He was almost sure she was about to faint.

“Y-you can’t just-” Marinette stammered. “You can’t just-just say things like that! I-”

“It’s true though,” Adrien said. “But I understand. You told me you loved someone else, and I'll admit I didn’t take that well. Kept flirting anyway. Losing you 25,913 times put some things in perspective. So I say go for it. I’d rather you be happy than ‘mine’.”

“Ch- Adrien,” she sighed. “You’re lucky you’re pretty because wow you’re oblivious.”

“Huh?” he replied, taking his turn to tilt his head.

“The ‘other guy’?” she said, almost laughing. “The one I kept turning Chat down for? It-it’s you.”

Well then. Wasn’t that something? Adrien had thought he’d be ready for just about anything happening today. Pretty much everything except Marinette confessing that she’d been in love with him.

“Oh,” Adrien finally managed to find his words. “That… a few things make sense now.”

“Like how I could barely talk to you?” Marinette said.

“That,” he said. “And the way Alya keeps pushing you to do things with me.”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “She was trying to help, but it kept putting pressure on me and making it worse. Somehow learning you’re the dork in a cat costume flinging puns helped calm my nerves. Probably because I talk to you like a normal person all the time!”

“It also explains that thing in the wax museum,” he said.

“You are never allowed to bring that up again!” she said. “That was just me joking around with a statue!”

“Come on,” he laughed. “I’ve done plenty of dumb things in front of you!”

“Not that dumb!” she said. “If you bring that up again I will contemplate breaking up with you!”

“I-uh, well,” he swallowed, any rebuttal dying as he thought about that. “That implies we’re together in the first place?”

“Well, I mean, I assumed,” she said. “Since you said, you know. And I still, uh, that is. If you’d want to-”

“I think I’d like that,” he said. “Though as much as I’d like to plan a first date right now, I really need to check what all I have scheduled.”

“We can talk later,” she said. “Speaking of schedule though, we’re probably really late to class by now.”

“Right,” he nodded. “Want to head back?”

“Well,” she said. “There’s one thing we should do first.”

He was about to ask what when she grabbed his shirt, pulling him into a kiss. Despite the surprise, he quickly melted into it. Putting a hand on her waist, he kissed back. And after waiting for so long, they might’ve gotten a little lost in the moment.

“So,” Adrien said when they finally parted. “Guess that wasn’t some memory-erasing kiss, huh?”

“I don’t know,” Marinette giggled back. “I think I’m feeling a little hazy.”

“I was more talking about how I usually don’t get to remember when we kiss,” he said.

“Don’t worry, kitty,” she said. “You can remember them as much as you want.”

“Hopefully for a long time,” he said. “Hm. Let’s see. I spent 25,913 times trying and failing to save you. How about I spend 25,913 days just loving the fact that you exist.”

“You realize that equals out to about seventy years, right?” she said.

“I’m up for the challenge,” he said. “Though it’s a fairly easy challenge.”

While that flustered her, he took the chance to kiss her again. Just a quick one. They did have to get back to class after all. This time, however, it was Marinette taking his hand to drag him through the halls.

They practically burst into the classroom, already giving apologies. Saying they were just talking and got too distracted to pay attention to the time. Miss Bustier was a bit too used to the two of them disappearing and reappearing at random. She just told them to take their seats.

It was probably a good thing they hadn’t ended up sitting next to each other when all the seats moved around. There was no way either of them could concentrate already being in the same room. Imagining how little they’d get done sitting next to each other was ridiculous.

Surprisingly, no one decided to stop class and interrogate them on the conversation. Alya tried to at least ask in hushed whispers, but Marinette calmed her with just saying that they’d explain at lunch. And of course Alya didn’t take the hint after hearing her say that the both of them would be explaining.

Though Adrien did think that perhaps they should skip the lunch conversation and save it until after school. Have some time alone to get the story straight. After all, they can't tell her about Ladybug and Chat Noir.

Perhaps they’d get that chance after all. Everyone’s phone went off at once, obviously alerts of an Akuma in the area. The new couple both stood up immediately, making excuses to leave and bolting out before Miss Bustier had even really given more than an exhausted look.

Running through halls while holding hands was apparently the theme of the day. But Adrien didn’t mind. Just being near her was, well, Miraculous.

**Author's Note:**

> Writing Marinette from other character's pov is always weird to me. Because like. When I write from her pov I can write out her thought process and how she gets to certain things. But other characters don't see said thought process so she seems all over the place in her decisions. It's weird.


End file.
